The Potential of Biological Solar Cell

What if dirty water can be the main source of energy? Seokheun Choi is the leader of the research to convert dirty bacteria into clean energy at Binghampton University, United States by using a solar cell (micro-BSC). So, lets found out the development of this project.

The objective of the device provides ‘stand-alone, independent, self-sustainable point-of-care diagnostic devices to work in limited-resource and remote regions’ (Lio and Choi, 2017). The solar cells have produced ‘a greater power density than any micro-BSC systems’ and able to ‘produced a sustained power of around 18.6µW per cm2 during the day and around 11.3µW per cm2 at night’ (Nathan, 2017) for up to 20 days.

For Choi, the research will help to further the current model micro-BSC that have only produced power density outputs in the range of nW per per cm2

The invention: This is a miniaturized biological solar cell assembled micro-BSC device by Seokheun Choi

The device consisted of a film of a cyanobacterium – a type of simple single celled-plant called Synechocystis. Through the process of photosynthesis, cynobacteria ‘tend to grow in biofilms, spontaneously organising themselves into colonies’ (Nathan, 2017).

“However, the promise of this technology has not been translated into practical applications because of its relatively low power and current short lifetimes,” according to Choi.

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